The Foundress of the Daughters of the Cross Mother Marie Therese

Mother Marie Therese was born in Liege on February 2, 1782.

Her Childhood and early womanhood were lived against the political upheaval of the French Revolution in so far as it affected Belgium. She experienced the loss of home, loved ones, possessions, and knew what it was to be poor and displaced, to have nothing. Her only security was in God. It was through contemplating the self-giving of Jesus on the cross, that she founded the congregation of the Daughters of the Cross in Liege on September 8, 1833.

The Congregation spread to Germany and England. From the very start the sisters were open to answer the call of all the weak and suffering –be they children or old people. Teaching, the original occupation, was soon followed by care for the sick, for girls and women in moral danger, the abandoned and handicapped.

Mother Marie Therese died on January 7, 1876.

To-day the congregation has spread to Italy, Ireland, United States, India, Pakistan, Brazil and the sisters are engaged in works of general and special education, care of the sick, the aged, abandoned children and the socially deprived.